What is a glazing contractor worth?

A glazing contractor installs storefronts, curtain wall and window wall on commercial buildings, and may also do smaller residential window and door replacement work. Ask how that mix bears on risk: whether most of the earnings come from large commercial projects or from replacement jobs. If you are an owner trying to understand what you have, ask which parts of your earnings a stranger could expect to see again next year, and which parts depend on you personally. Every section below is about mechanism. None of it is a valuation, and a figure for your business has to come from a qualified valuator working from your records.

Recasting earnings before anyone prices them

BDC notes that buyers will ask to see historic and interim financial statements, projections and tax returns. In a project business, ask whether one large job finishing in a different year moves profit sharply. Ask your accountant whether a recast should adjust the owner’s pay to a replacement wage, remove one-off items, and put each year’s earnings next to the project mix that produced them. Compare a recast that shows a steady stream of mid-sized jobs with one that shows a single outsized project. Ask your accountant to prepare both views, and keep the working papers behind them.

Project track record and who holds the relationships

Ask whether a list of completed commercial projects with named developers and general contractors would survive a change of ownership. If bid pricing, estimating and every general-contractor relationship sit in one head, ask what a purchaser would be paying for once you leave. If a second estimator or project manager has carried bids and talked directly to the same contacts, that suggests the work belongs to the company. Write down who built each relationship, who prices the bids and whether any customer has said in writing that it would keep inviting the company to bid.

Crew, certification and equipment

If your crews work at heights or from suspended access, check which rules apply. Provincial occupational health and safety rules cover workplaces, and Alberta, for one, publishes its own Occupational Health and Safety Act, regulation and code. Keep a current record of who holds which certificate and when each expires, so you can show them on request. The same goes for suction lifters, cranes and swing stages. CRA’s capital cost allowance classes treat machinery and other equipment used in the business as depreciable property, so ask your accountant for the asset list behind your capital cost allowance claims, and add condition, age and replacement timing to it.

The warranty tail on finished work

Ask what would happen if a seal failed or water got in years after a project was handed over. Be ready for questions about what has already happened. Keep a log of every claim, callback and dispute, what it cost and how it closed. If water-infiltration claims on completed curtain-wall projects form a pattern, that is a question about exposure, not earnings. A documented history lets you answer it. Do not guess at this. If a claim is open, say so early and have your lawyer advise on how it should be described.

Why similar companies can look different

Two glazing contractors with the same revenue can look nothing alike once these layers are separated. One may rely on a few commercial customers and an owner who bids every job. Another may have a trained estimating team, certified crews and records for every claim. A third may be mostly residential replacement work with a different customer base entirely. If a purchaser is asked to take on assets, people, contracts and warranty exposure, ask how each piece would be examined. Documenting each in advance gives you an answer ready.

How this differs from other trades

Glazing sits close to other trades but is not the same business. Ask whether your earnings come from repeat service customers or from bid-and-build project work, and what long tail follows what you installed. For the wider picture of how trades businesses are looked at, see buying a trades business in Canada. If your company also makes its own units rather than only installing them, ask whether it would be assessed as a manufacturer instead; a different guide covers that. Be clear in your own paperwork about which of these you are.

What to do before asking for a number

Before you ask anyone for a figure, assemble the pack: recast earnings, the project list, the people who hold relationships, the certificate register, the equipment list and the claims log. Ask a qualified valuator what else they would want to see. Decide whether your own role could be reduced over a year or two. This is planning, not a prediction of price.

• A recast of earnings by year, shown against the project mix behind each year.
• A short list of who holds each key customer relationship and who prices the bids.
• Crew certification records with expiry dates, plus the age and condition of lifting and access equipment.
• A claims log covering water-infiltration, seal-failure and callback history on finished work.
• A note of which work is commercial project work and which is residential replacement work.